Last fall we ran a
very short piece explaining for whom Hamilton Field (Cal-Mum High School
football field) is named. In that article, I said that documented
information about the field was somewhat scarce, and that I relied on
personal accounts from a local family to help me piece together the
story.

Soon after that I heard from
Mary Cullinan who works as a volunteer at the Big Springs Museum. Mary
said that the article had spurred her to investigate the museum’s
materials relating to Caledonia School history. Mary assembled an
enormous amount of historical information chronicling the story of
Caledonia’s schools, from beginning to present, including not only the
various building projects, but also the local community’s involvement
in school affairs.

Recognizing the amount of hours
Mary has dedicated to this, I am very grateful to her and hope all of
our readers will enjoy as much as I have the story of our dear alma
mater, Caledonia-Mumford School. There is much to write, so we will
break this up over a few issues. This week we will examine the earliest
school up to the early 1930’s.

Early Schoolhouse

Recorded history dates the
first school to have opened in about 1804, most likely in a private home
somewhere in the Caledonia area. Miss Jeanette MacDonald operated it.
From that point on, it is clear, that the people of this community
placed a very high regard on education, and were deeply involved in
school affairs such as ensuring the funds for school materials, hiring
competent administrators to run the school and attracting good teachers
to educate the students. Many of these written accounts published in the
local newspaper The Caledonia Era, and later, the Caledonia Advertiser,
reflect a deep sense of pride within the community concerning its
dedication to education and the school specifically.

In 1815 a new school building
constructed of logs was erected on North Street, across from Church
Street. A frame structure replaced it in 1819. Just a few years after
that, perhaps 1820 or 1825, a two story stone structure was built on
Center Street. From the Big Springs Museum’s files, an historian
writes…

"The desks in this school were
around the outside walls, the children facing the wall with benches all
around to sit on, girls on one side, boys on the other, with the master’s
desk and stove in the middle of the room. Many prominent people attended
this school, an outstanding character and teacher being Col. Alexander
Gordon, whose motto was "Never Spare the Rod." Mr. Gordon
apparently used a stick taken from a nearby elm tree to whip the unruly
children."

Railroad moves
schoolhouse to Main Street

Nearly 30 years later in the
early 1850’s, the Erie Railroad was constructed through the area and
the Center Street school building had to be torn down. It was replaced
by a frame building constructed on the north side of Main Street (near
our present day Tennent Park).

From a story that appeared in
the 1926 Ainodelac, "there were 94 pupils in the upper grade,
called the big room, and 70 pupils in the lower grade, called the small
room. There was one teacher for each room. School began at 9 a.m. with
the lower classes reciting first. They were excused when the teacher
finished hearing their lesson. The last classes were often not excused
until 5 p.m. With little blackboard space, blue paper was tacked around
the room and used as a blackboard. The 3 R’s were taught, higher
algebra, higher arithmetic and astronomy also were taught.

The schoolhouse was built off
the ground and in the winter time it was very cold and noisy so the
teacher put a wagon load of saw dust on the floor, thus making it warmer
and quieter. Sometimes there were more pupils than seats, so the boys
had to sit on shoeboxes carried over to the school from a local cobbler,
William Gibson’s, shop."

Four-room brick
school replaces old building in 1876

This building was later torn
down and replaced in 1876 with a four-room brick structure on the same
site (near the present little league field at Tennent Park) at a cost of
$10,000. (See picture of 1876 school).

According to legend, the bricks
of the 1876 school were made by a brickmaker, imported by William
Hamilton, to make the material for his house on North Street. Several
years later, Silver John McNaughton, while on a visit to Inverness,
Scotland, dug up and brought back with him, several roots of Scotch ivy
and planted them around the school foundation. When the front section
was added to the structure (around 1913, now the Big Springs Museum),
some of the roots were transplanted on both sides of the main entrance.

Caledonia High
School organized

By the late 1800’s the
enrollment included students from the primary grades through 12th
grade. In 1898 the school was organized as a high school by trustees F.W.
Walker, chairman, R.M. Place, clerk, Joseph Donohue, Charles Deichman,
Jay Bostwick, W. J. Williams and Frank Perhamus. Ara Wilkinson was the
first principal. The story continues….

"Where the baseball games
are now held there was once a large pond with islands, boats and little
bridges. In wintertime, this was a fine place to skate. There was a
sailboat, the Heatherbell, always ready to take the boys and girls out
riding. "

Additions made to
growing Caledonia High School

Additions were made to this
building in 1904 and 1913. Homemaking and commercial subjects were
added. A full time music teacher was hired and improved lighting and
heating facilities were completed. Men were added to the faculty and
athletic activities began. The Caledonia baseball team became Livingston
County Champions in 1925 and the football team played through the season
undefeated.

The school paper, The Elm,
printed its first issue in 1930 and in 1931 the school colors changed
from orange and purple to our familiar maroon and white.

All of this advancement in the
way Caledonia’s students were educated could not have happened without
a dedicated and supportive Caledonia community.

An excerpt from an unsigned
editorial in the local newspaper…."The high school building of a
town is usually pointed to with pride by every interested citizen and is
given a place of prominence and importance in the laying out of a
village."

From the Caledonia High School
Catalogue, August 16, 1897…."The people of Caledonia have good
reason to be proud of the building, which the school now occupies. It is
modern in equipment and furnishing, well lighted and heated. Much credit
is due the Board of Education and all others who have worked for
improvements, for the most excellent results accomplished."

Next, Caledonia High School
begins to outgrow its space on Main Street. Will they erect more
additions to the building or will school officials and the voters look
for a new site?

Caledonia School building circa
1876, located on Main Street in Caledonia, near the present Big Springs
Museum-police station buildings. It cost the taxpayers $10,000 to
construct this four-room school building that opened for a first term in
January 1877 with four teachers.

This photo shows the addition
made to the original school building. This is the view facing south,
Main Street. At this point the school is still called Caledonia High
School. Centralization had not come about as of yet.

PART II

Caledonia Hear Us
Praise Thee!

From the time of Caledonia's
early one-room schoolhouse in the early 1800's to the beautiful brick
structure constructed on Main Street in 1876, two things are clear. A
steady increase in student population caused a need for a larger school
facility, and the community responded by supporting the construction of
additional buildings. Placing a high value on education, Caledonia
residents, have over the decades, been keenly interested in maintaining
and expanding a quality education for the youth of this community.

District No. 5 Plans
New School

The need for additional
classroom space became an issue for the Caledonia School Board and the
voters again in the early 1930’s. The Caledonia Union Free School
District No. 5 had simply outgrown its present facility on Main Street
(presently the Big Springs Museum) despite two sizable additions over
the years to the original 1876 structure.

According to a Caledonia
newspaper clipping dated 1937, the voters of the district turned down a
school building proposition in 1932 because they weren’t convinced
that the old building wasn't sufficient for students. Additionally,
voters were cautious about spending such a large sum of money,
approximately $222,000. But by 1936, with the possibility of aid money
from the PWA (Public Works Administration of the Federal Government),
voters reconsidered the building proposition. From a 1936 Caledonia
newspaper…

"Between 40 and 50 duly
qualified voters of Caledonia Union Free School District No. 5 met last
Friday evening in the school auditorium to discuss a proposition which
provides for the construction of a new building with the aid of PWA
funds."

The building was estimated to
cost $222,000, with the PWA providing 45% of the cost or $100,000. The
district would need voter approval to bond the remaining $122,000. The
proposed new building was to be constructed near the present school on
Main Street but would face North Street (probably near the present Cal
Branch/Dr. Heuer office building and backing up the present Big Springs
Museum). The school board was not sure what they would do with the
present school, perhaps leave it in tact or torn down later.

Promise of PWA Funds
Helps Voters Approve New School

A strong campaign to educate
voters ensued. The school board held meetings explaining the estimated
cost of renovating and expanding the present building as opposed to
building a new school. Early in January of 1937 the voters once again
went to the polls in the school's study hall room to decide the fate of
a proposed new school, requiring voter approval to bond $140,000, the
taxpayers share of the project. Voters overwhelmingly approved the
project; 281 votes were cast in favor of a new school, 37 voters opposed
the project.

In an August 1937 Caledonia
newspaper clipping, the article stated that the project called for a
two-story building complete with a boiler and storage room, agricultural
shop, offices, auditorium, gymnasium, library, cafeteria, homemaking
room and locker room. The updated estimated cost for the new school was
now at $245,000, with an estimated 45% aid from the PWA.

School Board
Receives Generous Offer

Initial construction on the new
school was about to begin on the Main/North Street site in September
1937 when the school board received an interesting offer from a
prominent citizen, Mr. Wilson Hamilton. The letter to School Board
President John G. Ball from Mr. Hamilton read:

"In memory of my father,
William V. Hamilton, I hereby offer to convey to Union Free School
District No. 5 of Caledonia, New York, thirteen acres of land out of the
land owned by me fronting on North Street in the Village of Caledonia.
This offer is made upon condition that the District build the proposed
new school house thereon."

This piece of land was located
approximately three quarters of a mile further north on North Street,
outside of the business district site where the voters had already
approved the new school to be built. However, the school board responded
by informing the public that "the school board is powerless to
act" on Mr. Hamilton’s offer. According to state education law,
the district was bound to abide by the approved vote to construct the
new school on the present site. It was proposed by the local newspaper
editor to circulate a petition among the voters to determine if there
was enough interest to revote the building project on the Hamilton land.

Voters Reject
Hamilton’s Offer

In November of 1937 the
district held a special meeting for residents of District No. 5 to
consider Mr. Hamilton’s offer to donate 13 acres of land on North
Street for the purpose of building the new school. Board President Ball
presided over the meeting that ended in a motion to vote by ballot
whether to accept the offer or not. The polls were kept open until 9:30
p.m. when the final count was announced: 183 No votes to 135 Yes votes,
1 blank. The "No" majority meant that the voters had rejected
Hamilton’s offer and the school would be built as originally planned
near the existing school and extending east to face North Street. In a
letter to the editor published the week after the offer was voted down,
a Mr. Thomas Coulthard of Spring Street in Caledonia writes,

"In my opinion the people
of Caledonia are lucky the referendum went as it did last Friday night.
It would have been an outrage for the tots from the west end to have to
walk half way to Mumford in the winter with snow and traffic."

Water Trouble
Plagues Construction Site

The voters had spoken but the
school board’s troubles with getting the building started were not. In
late December 1937, the district’s architect ceased all excavation
work at the site when workers discovered poor soil conditions, so poor
that a foundation could not be put there. Workers had hit water and the
architect estimated that the cost to continue building on this site was
going to soar.

The Board of Education again
called a meeting of the qualified voters to discuss reconsidering Mr.
Hamilton’s offer in light of the new development on the approved site.
The Board immediately contacted Hamilton who stood by his offer,
reiterating the offer was a memorial to his father, W.V. Hamilton. Board
President Ball presided over the meeting held at the school and attended
by about 250 people. The architect explained to the taxpayers what poor
building conditions they encountered and apologized for having initially
recommended the site. The Board of Education accepted the architect’s
recommendation to abandon the present school site and move the school
somewhere else. By a show of hands, the taxpayers in attendance also
voted to abandon the site.

Board and Voters
Reconsider Hamilton’s Offer

The district had two
alternatives; accept Mr. Hamilton’s free offer of 13 acres of land on
North Street, or proceed to purchase 15 acres of land on State Street
from Charles Place for $5,000. Of course, this time the architects
performed tests on the soil at both sites before the district decided on
either location. The State Education Department made the decision a
little easier for the district when word came from Albany that since the
North Street property was being acquired free (the State St. property
would cost the district $5,000), the district could vote only on the
North Street property, not the State St. property.

Just as you would imagine a
controversy of this type to be played out in our present day, this issue
caused considerable turmoil in the community. Everyone had an opinion
about how this mistake happened. Does the district really need a bigger
school? Couldn’t the students continue in the present building? Did
the district keep information from the voters? Should the new school be
built so far from the village? What is all of this going to cost? But
just as this community always seems to do, they pulled themselves
together and made their decision based on what would provide the best
education for Caledonia’s children. On January 14, 1938 the voters
once again went to the polls and approved the North Street site, free
land from Mr. Hamilton, by a vote of 220 Yes to 76 No.

Pupils Parade to New
School, Ceremony Marks Cornerstone

The community and Board of
Education were proud of their accomplishments and construction on the
new school was finally underway. The district planned an impressive
ceremony to mark the laying of the cornerstone of the new building. On a
warm June afternoon in 1938, the Caledonia High School Band led a parade
of pupils from the present school on Main Street to the construction
site of their new building on North Street. The program at the new site
included the band performing "America the Beautiful," an
invocation by Rev. D.C. MacLeod, remarks by a PWA representative (the
branch of the federal government supplying aid for the project), and a
speech by School Superintendent J.C.Foote, Jr. Harry Annin, President of
the Big Springs Historical Society presented a sealed box containing
historical documents, a copy of the Caledonia Advertiser, Ainodelac, and
the signatures of every pupil of the Caledonia School District No. 5.
The box was sealed in the cornerstone of the community’s new school.

School officials hoped the new
building would be ready in September 1939 for the start of the new
school year, however the long awaited new Caledonia School opened in
October 1939 with the largest student population in Caledonia’s
history.

click on photo
to enlarge ....

PART III

Caledonia, Hear Us
Praise Thee

The following information was
taken from Esther M. Hayward’s "Caledonia,A
History of the Town and Village."

As we learned in the second
series of Caledonia, Hear Us Praise Thee, it was with much controversy
and several set backs that the Caledonia School District No. 5 built a
new school. The school building was erected on North Street on
property donated by Mr. William Hamilton. The building cost $240,000,
$100,000 of which was federally funded with WPA money. The taxpayers
picked up the balance of $140,000 that was paid off in the 1962-1963
school year. The school opened in the fall of 1939 with 218 pupils in
grades one and two, 216 students in the higher grades. Presently, this
building is our Caledonia-Mumford Elementary School, housing students
in grades K-5 with an approximate enrollment of 650 pupils.

Other interesting
facts from the timeline include:

1940 –The school cafeteria
opened.

1950 – The Central District
was established, and an addition to the school is planned.

1951 – Kindergarten is held in
a house on McKenzie Place.

"On February 17, 1952, it
was voted to build an addition to the new school on North Street.
Construction began on April 15, 1952. The building was occupied on
September 9, 1953. The addition cost $880,000, the garage that was
also built behind the school cost $80,000. The total project costing
$960,000. The addition was dedicated on November 13, 1953."

1953 – The new school is
dedicated, the Mumford School closes, busing began. Students from
Mumford and Clifton transfer to Caledonia.

1962 – PTA is organized.

1963 – A new high school is
built, occupied by students in 1965.

1965 – The last graduation is
held from the first school on North Street.

1976 – The old school on Main
Street burns and is taken down.

1987 – The Caledonia-Mumford
PTA is reorganized.

ADDITIONAL
MUMFORD SCHOOL INFORMATION

Superintendent of Schools David
Dinolfo forwarded this information to me from the history files at
school. Again, the information is taken from the late Esther Hayward’s
history book.

"In 1803, a log school
house was built by the Scottish settlers in "Mission
Corners." This was south of the Oatka Creek Road, and west of the
bridge over Oatka Creek. It was the first school house built west of
the Genesee River. It also housed the Caledonia Presbyterian Church
which is the oldest living church west of the Genesee. This site is
marked today with a boulder and flag pole just north of the bridge
over Oatka Creek, at the intersection of Route 36 and
Scottsville-Mumford Road."

In a conversation between Mr.
Dinolfo and myself concerning the school history series, I shared with
him the "chilling stories" that the Mumford students recall
about walking to school in the wintertime and having to cross the
bridge, the top of which was no doubt 20 degrees colder than the flat
land. Interestingly, Mr. Dinolfo remarked, "What bridge?"
Ay, yes, the dreaded Mumford bridge, as it was called, is no longer
located north of the fish hatchery near Burnwell. It must be about
five years since the decrepit bridge was demolished by the New York
Department of Transportation.

For the newcomers to our area,
there was for many, many years, a bridge over the railroad tracks on
Rt. 36 north that connected our two communities, Caledonia and
Mumford. Thanks to a grassroots effort by the citizens of the area,
the bridge, slated for repair, was instead demolished and replaced
with lighted railroad signals and crossing bars. Since it’s removal,
many folks have commented that it makes the two communities seem even
closer together. That is true, however, the people from Mumford will
not likely forget their daily walk over the bridge to and from school.

"The first Mumford School
was located on the corner of Williams and Dakin Streets and opened in the
1820’s. In 1832 a one story stone structure was built between the first
school and Main Street. The brick school on Dakin Street was built around
1860, originally one room. At the turn of the century, around 1902 – 03,
a second room was added along with four more teachers. At this time the
sixth grade and all the high school students were in the library. In 1950
Caledonia School centralized and over the next three years all the Mumford
students, along with those from Clifton were gradually transferred to
Caledonia."

This
boulder and American flag mark the site of an 1803 log school
house in Mumford at the intersection of Routes 383 and 36
North.

click on photo below to
enlarge ...

CMCS era 1955

PART IV

Clifton
"kid" recalls coming to Caledonia School

Lynn Sackett, a
Clifton resident who recalls attending the rural school there until
his transfer to Caledonia, sent the following information to me. Lynn
was a member of the first senior class to graduate from
Caledonia-Mumford Central School. Centralization took place at
Caledonia in 1950.

For those of our
readers who may not know, the "new high school" that Lynn
refers to here is the current middle school building. I have been told
that it was indeed a battle to get the building passed and built.
Thank you Lynn for answering a question that many of us have been
trying to answer and that it is the location of the former football
field, before Hamilton Field existed. Someone said they thought that
the field was where the middle school is now. You have confirmed that.
It is interesting however, given the long standing tradition of Raider
football, that the voters allowed the district to begin constructing
the school before they had a new field in place. Caledonia played
their home games in LeRoy for a while, imagine that! Thank you Lynn
and Joyce Sackett for taking time to share this information with our
readers.

Clifton students
come to Caledonia

Clifton school was a 2 room school, grades 1-4 and 5-8
with two teachers until the fall of 1945. At that time, Clifton went
to one teacher; grades 1 through 6 and the 7th and 8th grades went to
Caledonia School. I was one of four that came to Caledonia. We were
the first class to graduate from CMCS in June of 1951. I think we had
30 in our class. In 1953, the Clifton school closed and all the kids
came to Caledonia. Later that year, the school was sold and is used as
a home. The school bell that was in the bell room is now mounted in
from of the new firehouse in Clifton by the flag pole.

I don't know when the bridge in Mumford was built. I
think it was in the 1930s about when the new school was built. When we
went over the bridge with the school bus in the morning, there would
be 40 or 50 people waiting for the B&O train to go to work in
Rochester. There was a steel walk from the top of the bridge to the
train station.

When the new high school was built, I think it took 3 or
4 votes to get it passed. There was a big war over it. They voted with
paper ballots and it would take 4 or 5 hours to get a count.

The school sits where the football field was when I was
in school. They had to build a new football field where it is today.
For two years, Caledonia played their home games in LeRoy. Hard to
think Caledonia didn't have a football field for two years.

PART V

It has been a pleasurable
stroll down memory lane looking at the history of the Caledonia, later
the Caledonia-Mumford School District. We left off by telling you that
a new school was built north and east of the present elementary
building. It opened to students in grades 7-12 in the fall of 1965.
That building is the present middle school and is also the main
auditorium where Cal-Mum's larger productions, such as concerts and
the musical, are held.

Caledonia-Mumford remained a
two-building school district from 1965 until the new high school was
built and opened in1998 for students in grades 9-12. At this time, the
1965 building was formally dedicated as a middle school, housing
students in grades 6-8. The bus garage located just east of the
elementary building was converted to the district office housing the
superintendent, his secretary, the business administrator, district
clerk, and the special education office.

So much has changed at
Caledonia-Mumford Elementary, Middle and High schools. To meet New
York's higher standards, students are faced with rigorous courses and
challenging schedules.

Nevertheless, much of what
school is all about, forming friendships, making memories, and gaining
valuable experience, is still very much the same. From the 1946
Ainodelac and a 1948 edition of The Elm, the school newspaper,
we want to share some interesting facts and amusing quips. Carol
Brown, Caledonia High Class of 1949, loaned me these items.

Caledonia High had a
26-member marching band, a 32-member senior chorus and a 41-member
junior chorus.

Athletic teams included a
football squad, a JV and varsity basketball team, a baseball team, and
Varsity C.

WWII was raging in Europe but
the young, ambitious students of the Class of 1946 were determined to
do their part for our country. Taken from the class history printed in
the Aindodelac we read:

"It was said that our
class was more ambitious than our worthy seniors, so we determined to
let everyone know it. We set about trying to reform the school -
campaigns for cleaner drinking fountains, three mirrors for the girls'
room and an assembly on "etiquette." Poor St. Patrick even
came under our wing when we held an assembly in his honor. Since this
was the time when scrap metal was scarce, we sponsored a dance, the
price of admission being a piece of metal. We had Mr. Hitler hanging
by the noose with oodles of scrap surrounding him, and this proved to
Prof. Ostrander that we could really do it."

In their class will, the
students wrote bequeaths to the high school faculty members. Among
them...

"To Mrs. Keith, our
sincere thanks for being the grandest English teacher we ever
had."

"To Mr. Melville, a band
that will surpass all other schools."

"To Mr. Freeman, the
hope that his future will be a rosy one."

The Elm, October
1948, Vol. 19, No. 1

On the subject of school
spirit, Editor Elizabeth Wilcox writes,

"Each and every one of
us can help make our school activities surpass all others by being
much more enthusiastic than we are now. Let's have as our
motto..."We only get out of our school what we put into it."

Features in The Elm included
Girl and Boy of the Month, sports news, news about class activities
and a gossip page. The "I'm Thankful" page allowed students
to share what they are thankful for. Here are some of their quotes:

"For LeRoy or anything
with red in it."
"That I'm happy and can enjoy life."
"For a little town named Clifton."
"That I live in Caledonia and for the many friends I
have found here."

The Elm, May 1949

From an editorial column
entitled "Your School - Is It Yours?"

"Your school should be
your school. You should participate in every school program where the
opportunity arises. You should make every program better than the one
before because you were a part of it. Unless you have done that your
claim to "your school" is false and the only way for making
a correction to an error is to try again. That, students, should be
your goal for next year. Be sure in May 1950 to be able to say in all
good faith "this is my school and it is better today because I
helped to make it that way."

Question of the Month: What
are you going to do this summer?

"Work and have good
time."
"Work at Doc Mann's Drug Store and eat ice
cream."
"Work in the Scottsville Pea Vinery."
"Work on the railroad, get in the best shape I have
ever been in, keep out of trouble."
"Work at the theater."

By far the most interesting
and amusing feature in The Elm is the Gossip page. However, to protect
the innocent Caledonia High students who still reside within the area,
we will not quote directly from it. Perhaps your parents still do not
know what you were up to in those days!

PART
VI

Our series,
"Caledonia, Hear Us Praise Thee," began in January of 2002
with a look at Caledonia’s earliest one-room school house and
chronicled the history of the Caledonia –Mumford School District to
the present day.

The series concludes this
week with a look at the three gentleman for whom the Caledonia-Mumford
School driveways are named for. Dr. Frederick Hinsdale, Mr. Robert
Freeman and Mr. Walter Pennington are very special men in the history
of this school district. It was with great pride that the school board
selected the names of these men for the driveways, to capture the
spirit of Caledonia-Mumford Central School.

The series cannot conclude
without giving credit to the woman who wrote the words,
"Caledonia, Hear Us Praise Thee," the first line of our Alma
Mater, written in 1926 by Margaret McCabe and sung countless times
since then at school functions.

Mr.
Robert Freeman
former principal at Caledonia-Mumford

Freeman Drive is the
first driveway you meet as you approach the Caledonia-Mumford
School campus at 99 North Street from Caledonia. It runs along
the south side of the elementary school and is also the
entrance to the district offices, the middle school and the
football stadium.

Mr. Robert Freeman grew up in
neighboring Mumford. He graduated from Caledonia High School in 1932.
In 1939 Mr. Freeman returned to the halls of the Caledonia School
District as a high school social studies teacher. He was among the
first faculty to teach in the district’s new school building on
North Street, now the elementary building. The United States Army
temporarily interrupted Mr. Freeman’s career at Caledonia with a
tour of duty in the Pacific during WWII. Upon his return to Caledonia,
Mr. Freeman, like many other teachers in those days, taught several
subjects and also served as a guidance counselor to students and later
was named vice-principal. He was an advisor to various extracurricular
clubs and coached basketball, track and football. In 1961 Mr. Freeman
became principal. With the opening of the new junior-senior high
school building (the present day middle school) in 1965, Mr. Freeman
continued as principal of grades 7-12 until his retirement in 1977
with 38 years of service to the district. He passed away in 1990. His
youngest son John Freeman is a high school biology teacher at
Caledonia-Mumford High School.

Mr.
Walter Pennington
former elementary principal

Pennington Lane is
the next driveway on the campus. It follows the north side of
the elementary building and is used by visitors to the
playground.

Mr. Walter Pennington joined
the faculty of Caledonia-Mumford School in 1957 as a sixth grade
teacher. After just six months in the classroom, military service
called him away for a year of duty with the National Guard. Mr.
Pennington recalls that Dr. Hinsdale held his job for him and he
returned to the sixth grade classroom in 1958. For a short time he
taught junior high school science. Upon Dr. Hinsdale’s
recommendation, Mr. Pennington completed his administrative studies
and after ten years in the classroom, was offered the position of
Caledonia-Mumford Elementary School Principal in 1967. While he says
he loved teaching in the classroom, being the principal afforded him
the benefit of getting to know all of the children in the school. Mr.
Pennington and his wife Anne started a ski club for elementary
students and served as advisor to the club for many years. He says
Caledonia-Mumford was a "really nice place to work," and
credits a supportive community, the school board and administration
for the pleasant atmosphere. He retired as principal in 1989 with 32
years of service to Caledonia-Mumford. Mr. and Mrs. Pennington reside
in Lima, N.Y. and enjoy traveling and skiing. The couple returned for
the Alumni Day celebration and enjoyed dinner with the Class of 1964
which Mr. Pennington had been advisor to for many years.

Dr.
Frederick Hinsdale
former superintendent of schools

Hinsdale
Lane is the driveway on the north side of the campus that leads
directly to the bus garage and new high school.

Dr. Frederick
Hinsdale became superintendent of schools at Caledonia-Mumford in 1951
at the onset of centralization. Students residing on the fringes of the
surrounding towns, Mumford, Wheatland, Clifton, LeRoy, and Avon began
being bused to Cal-Mum resulting in an explosion in the student
population. The beautiful 1939 school building on North Street was no
longer adequate space for the district and so a large addition to the
school was approved and completed in 1953. As we know, additional
schools were opened on campus in 1965 and in 1998.

Mr. Charles
Collins was the first teacher Dr. Hinsdale hired. Collins taught high
school biology, then became vice-principal and eventually principal.
Stories like this were repeated many times in Dr. Hinsdale’s tenure as
one of the things that earned him a great deal of respect was his
ability to recognize and select the finest teachers around for the
Caledonia-Mumford faculty. Because of his outstanding leadership,
Caledonia-Mumford earned a reputation for academic excellence that
spread far and wide.

In his Alumni Day
speech, Dr. Hinsdale himself shared what he is most of proud of
accomplishing at Caledonia-Mumford, the special education program. Dr.
Hinsdale was instrumental in establishing one of the first special
education programs for developmentally disabled children in the county.
No doubt, the impetus for his determination was his own son who was able
to benefit from Cal-Mum’s program and complete his education in his
home school district. Since then, hundreds of students have enjoyed the
same benefit.

Dr. Hinsdale
retired as Caledonia-Mumford’s superintendent in 1981 with 30 years of
service to the district. The new high school building was dedicated to
Dr. Hinsdale. A dedication plaque in his honor hangs in the foyer of the
building. Dr. Hinsdale’s daughter, Valerie Connor, is now a retired Cal-Mum
middle/high school librarian.

Margaret McCabe
wrote Caledonia’s Alma Mater in 1926. The famous words
"Caledonia, Hear Us Praise Thee" is the first line of a three
verse melody that continues to stir pride in the hearts of all Red
Raiders, past and present.

Alma Mater

Caledonia, hear us
praise thee; all hail to thy dear name;

Oh may we ne’er
disgrace thee or cause thee any shame,

We will honor thee
and love thee, obey thy law and rule,

For none can rank
above thee, Caledonia, our dear school.

You have taught us
to be steadfast, to be faithful, good and true;

To be honest in our
dealings and always loyal too.

These aren’t all
the priceless lessons we’ve learned at they footstool,